The strange pacifist project that inspired the fascists

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How a utopian idea, that of the American sculptor Hendrik Andersen, served as a model for Mussolini, who aspired to create a “new Rome” in 1942.

By Gabriel Bouchaud

“Rome is the name that has filled all of history for twenty centuries. Rome gives the signal of universal civilization. » This is what Benito Mussolini declared, as early as 1920, even before the creation of the National Fascist Party and the march on Rome, about the Italian capital. This quote, found by Jean-Baptiste Malet, author of The Capital of Humanityis one of many illustrations of what the idea of ​​a revival of Rome meant in the minds of the fascists.

Rome, capital of humanity? This is what the American sculptor Hendrik Andersen, established in Rome, wanted to see happen at the end of his life. By following this character, the work of Jean-Baptiste Malet tells the utopian project of creating a “World Center of Communication”, supposed to allow the…

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